


The weight of family and the pull of gravity

by SkyScribbles



Series: A thousand fingerprints on the surfaces of who I am [10]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Canonical Minor Character Death, Emotionally Abusive/Distant Parenting, Fantasy Religion, Gen, Jumping back and forth between timelines, Kryn Dynasty Worldbuilding, Mentions of temporary major character death, Non-Chronological, Parent Death, Sibling Bonding, Sibling Rivalry, The bonding takes a while because Essek is... Essek, hints of shadowgast, sibling relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:55:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25767055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkyScribbles/pseuds/SkyScribbles
Summary: Verin Thelyss has spent a lifetime in the shadow of the Shadowhand. If he and Essek ever had a chance to be brothers, it died almost a century ago.So he isn't entirely sure why Essek has invited him to dinner with some friends of his. Some group of foreign mercenaries called the Mighty Nein.
Relationships: Essek Thelyss & Verin Thelyss, The Mighty Nein & Essek Thelyss, Verin Thelyss & Deirta Thelyss
Series: A thousand fingerprints on the surfaces of who I am [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1874992
Comments: 63
Kudos: 464





	The weight of family and the pull of gravity

**Author's Note:**

> There is a colossal amount of guesswork in this fic, including but not limited to: Verin's entire personality, Essek and Verin's relationship with each other and their parents, the circumstances behind their father's death, Dynasty society, etc... I've done my best to work these things out based on the minimal information we have, but I am 100% comfortable with knowing it's all gonna be jossed if we ever meet Verin or Deirta in canon.
> 
> This is set about a year after the current time in-game, and assumes that Essek has spent that time travelling with the Nein every so often, and going through some growth. Though it's part of a series, you don't need to have read the other works to follow this one.

The letter is sealed in purple wax and stamped with the Den Thelyss crest. It is addressed to Verin, and he does not want to read it.

It's rare - offensively rare, really - for any of his family to write to him, rather than Sending. There's a twisted power play at work, he thinks, in their refusal to set paper to ink; sneering boasts laced into the words that jolt through his skull. _Good evening, Verin. Remember how you inept you are at all things arcane? Remember how you rely on couriers and Sending Stones, while I can speak to whomever I wish, whenever I wish? Wonderful. Now, let me bore you with some irrelevant news from Rosohna._

Whoever sent this letter, then, has something to say that can't be crammed into twenty-five smug words. If the Light is with Verin, it will be something tedious and family-related – a wedding invitation, perhaps, which will necessitate only a single day’s boredom and a pretence of happiness for some snotty cousin.

If the Light is not with him, then he has angered his mother. This is a lecture that wouldn’t fit into the sliced-up bites of Sendings, and Verin is screwed.

He sucks in a breath and tears the envelope open.

The letter inside is a single sheet, lined with neat black words in perfect rows. The salutation reads _Verin,_ and he huffs out some of his tension. Not his mother, then. She has addressed him as _Taskhand_ ever since he earned that title, as if to make it absolutely clear that her youngest, new-souled son is – wonder of wonders! – capable of achieving things. Verin smooths the letter out on his desk, and reads.

_You are invited to dinner with myself and my friends, the Mighty Nein, at their abode –_

Verin stops. Rereads. Re-rereads.

He recognises the writing now. Which he should have done sooner, really, but he’s grown out of the habit of recognising his brother's hand. Essek hasn’t written to him in –

Well. Essek hasn’t written to him. Eyebrows raised about as high as they can go, Verin reads on.

 _The address is 9, Ka’lith Avenue, the Firmaments. You will know it by the tree._ _We will be available until the end of the week, whereupon the Mighty Nein will be departing Rosohna. Please let me know if you wish to attend, and a suitable date, at your earliest convenience._

_We hope to have you join us._

_Essek._

Verin reads the letter again. And once more, in case it’s less bizarre this time around. Then, because he’s in his office and no one is there to see, he reaches for the tether of potential energy inside him, manifests his echo, and holds the paper out to it. ‘I don’t suppose you come from a timeline where this makes sense?’

The echo blinks mutely at him.

‘Nothing? You mean even in an alternate reality, Essek still lacks the capacity to be an attentive and affectionate brother?’

A pause, while the echo flickers at the edges and stands motionless. Verin slumps back in his chair. ‘You amaze me.’

The number of absurdities in the letter is staggering. First, that it was sent at all; second, that Essek is going out of his way to spend time with Verin. Third, that Essek used the words _my friends._ Essek doesn’t _do_ things like communicating with family and inviting them to dinner – and he definitely doesn’t do anything so pedestrian as having _friends._ There is only one familiar part to this, and it’s Essek writing a dinner invitation to his brother with a formality usually reserved for invitations to career interviews.

Verin shoves his chair back, and lifts both feet to rest on his desk. ‘Chances are,’ he says, waving the letter in the echo’s direction, ‘it’s a political ploy of some kind. Maybe these –’ He checks the letter – ‘ _Mighty Nein_ have a request to make of me, and they hope to put me in a good mood by going through my brother and a fancy dinner.’

The echo shimmers silently.

‘Yes, I agree. Putting me in the same room as Essek is a terrible way to butter me up.’

Because Essek is Essek. Because Verin is tired of being ignored by his family until the moment he becomes someone they can use. Because Essek has barely shared a word or a room with Verin since their father's funeral, and now, just as Verin has settled into the idea that they are brothers in name only - _now,_ Essek asks for his time, his company? Now, Essek wants to act like family? Now, Essek wants Verin to meet his friends?

There it is again, though, the impossible word: _friends._

Verin glances at his echo, shrugs, and reaches for his inkwell. If this is more political bullshit, he’ll do himself no favours by keeping himself in the dark about what Essek is trying to wheedle from him. He dabs the quill into the ink, and writes.

_Essek,_

_Never thought I’d see the day when you sought my company. I’m on leave soon; I can be in Rosohna on the twelfth of Misuthar at about seven in the evening, if that’s agreeable to the Mighty Nein. I look forward to meeting them._

_Verin._

_PS – Friends?_

* * *

‘You should know, Verin,’ says Deirta Thelyss, on the morning of her youngest son's fifteenth birthday, ‘I spoke to Adras Mirimm. From the military academy.’

Essek's hands – one holding a fork, one flipping the squiggle-covered pages of a spellbook – go still. Verin swallows. Their father looks between the two of them, then at the table, then at his wife.

If the Umavi notices the thickening tension in the room, she doesn’t remark on it. ‘I told them that you’ve shown promise, the kind that they would be interested in. You are strong, and intelligent –’

Essek makes a sound that might be a snort, but when Verin glances at him, he’s rolling up his rice pancake with a blank expression.

‘ – and they said they would be willing to offer you a place, once you’re of age. Should you pass the trials, that is, and should you be willing. I thought it prudent to make arrangements for your future, considering…’

Verin stares at his food. His father glances at him again, then says, ‘It may not be necessary. I'm certainly not opposed to this idea, but Verin may yet experience anamnesis.’

‘Perhaps. But what with…’ The Umavi gestures towards Essek, whose face instantly becomes, if possible, even blanker. ‘Experience has proven that we cannot trust that our children are returning souls. Call this a contingency plan. If Verin has not had a place in the world secured for him by a previous life, then that place must be secured for him. And he must make a start on earning it.’ She drains her coffee, and stands. ‘I am needed in court. Consider what I have said, Verin, and what answer I am to give to Adras.’

Five minutes later, their father follows. The doors close, and Verin is left to pick at his food and resent the feel of Essek’s eyes on him.

‘Will you take that place?’ Essek says, once their father’s footsteps have faded.

‘I’m… not reluctant. It’s a moot point if I go through anamnesis, but if –’

‘There is no _if._ You’re fifteen. You’re a new soul, Verin.’

Verin grits his teeth and grabs another pancake. He wants to say _we can't know that,_ but the words won’t come, and he knows they would not be true even if they did. No one goes through anamnesis at his age. ‘So what do you recommend? I suppose you'd have me join the Conservatory and spend my days barricaded in a library.’

‘And why not? It is certainly a more dignified existence than spending your days as glorified muscle –’

‘I'd be spending my days _p_ _rotecting Xhorhas._ Pass the potatoes.’

A silence. Essek pours himself another mug of coffee, stares at it for a moment, then says, ‘So you will join the academy?’

‘Probably, yes. And if you’re going to make fun of that, then don’t, because –’

Essek flicks his wrist. Reality splits above him; two books fall out of the void between planes and into his palms. Essek re-seals his wristpocket, and pushes the books across the table towards Verin. ‘Take these. I am finished with them. Consider them a birthday gift.’

They're heavy things, their spines bound with metal rather than leather. The first is entitled _Chronurgy: The Art of Potential;_ the second, _On Possibility and Actuality._

‘I told you,' Verin says, shoving the books back in Essek's direction. 'I'm not joining the Conservatory –’

‘You have a reasonably good mind. If Adras Mirimm has any sense, they will train you as an Echo Knight. You have the potential.’ Essek’s hands disappear back inside his cloak. ‘You are a new soul. And as soon as that becomes clear to the rest of the Dynasty, those who have previous lives will regard you as a child at best, and a nobody at worst. Those who are also new souls? They will see you as a competitor.’ He gestures towards the books. ‘These will teach you the basic theory behind the controlling of time. If you wish to stand above your peers, you must understand the theory of your art even before you have begun to practice it.’

 _And if I succeed in that, will Mother deign to acknowledge my existence, once in a while?_ Verin thinks – but he does not say it. Because he has so rarely seen the Umavi acknowledge Essek’s existence, and he cannot hope to do better than his brother, the genius, the prodigy. Verin grips the book covers, torn between gratitude and hate.

‘I won't look a gift moorbounder in the mouth,’ he says at last.

‘Remember it. I may call in a return favour someday.’ Essek pushes his cutlery together and gets to his feet – or to his float, rather. ‘Don’t cling to the idea that you’re about to wake up and remember being someone else. You are Verin. My recommendation is that you to get to work on making that enough for the Den.'

And Verin wants to ask Essek how he’s done it, how he has survived being Essek, just Essek, only Essek. But he looks at his brother, hiding behind his cloak, who cannot even give Verin a birthday present without turning it into a transaction, and he knows: Essek has not survived it. He has let it freeze him and harden him until he has become - _this._

‘No one is going to make this easy for you,’ Essek says. He pauses in the doorway, and looks back – but there’s no warmth in his eyes, no apology, and Verin knows that _no one_ includes his brother. _Those who are new souls will see you as a competitor,_ Essek said. And Essek is a new soul.

Verin watches his brother leave, and he promises, silently: _I will never be you._

* * *

Verin dispatches his reply to Essek by courier, and regrets its postscript every day for a month.

It was a joke. He meant it as the kind of needling joke you tell when you’re someone’s brother, except he didn't. He meant it as a jab. It was petty, and it was cruel, and it was the kind of thing that Essek might have said to him.

He promised himself once that he would never turn into Essek. He does not want to make a liar of himself.

So when the twelfth of Misuthar arrives, and he walks through the streets of Rosohna with a bottle of wine under his arm, he makes himself another promise: he will be good to Essek’s friends, and to Essek, as much as they make it possible. If they have befriended Essek, they're likely his ilk: intellectuals fluent in disdain. But Verin can bear that. Countless Den functions have made him adept at keeping an easy smile on his face, at deflecting barbed comments with the shield of a friendly laugh. Verin has held off demon armies; he can be good to Essek and his friends for an evening. Though it's pretty terrible that those two things demand the same amount of willpower.

He sees the tree Essek mentioned long before he reaches the house. It juts from the roof, a spire of leaves and glowing lanterns, and Verin has to stop for a moment. Partly to admire it. Partly to process the fact that Essek has befriended people who care so little for the scorn of the surrounding Dens that they'd decorate their house in such a way. It’s bright. Unapologetic. It's the mark of _happy_ people, the kind of people who love light and living, growing things.

Up close, the house is still more confusingly un-Essek-ish. There’s a garden beneath the tree, a riot of rainbow petals, and behind the walls there's a clamour of unfamiliar voices raised to volumes that - in Verin’s experience - Essek responds to with gritted teeth and a request to keep it down.

He frowns at the house for a moment more, then knocks.

A pause. A click as the door unlocks and opens. For a moment, Verin thinks the hall before him is empty. Then he looks down, and meets the eyes of a halfling woman in a bright yellow dress and a button necklace.

‘Um,’ Verin says. ‘I’m Verin Thelyss. My brother told me I was invited to dinner. I hope I have the right address?’

_Idiot. As if there are other houses with halflings and giant trees in Rosohna._

A pause. The halfling’s eyes run over him, lingering on his biceps. She tilts her head, gives a single decisive nod, and says ‘You’re hotter than he is.’

‘I’m sorry?’

The halfling is already turning around, yelling down the entryway. ‘He’s here!’ Glancing back at Verin, she adds, ‘Mind the clutter. And the weasel.’

‘Um. Sure,’ Verin says, because he has no idea how else to respond to that. And also because the hallway is crammed with things that speak of lives lived within these walls, and lived well. Coats and jackets and scarves hang from hooks, scorched and stained, frayed at the hems. Paintings explode across the walls – unicorns, hamsters, unicorn hamsters. Raspberry-coloured lichen and phosphorescent mushrooms blossom from flowerpots.

There has to be some mistake. Essek would not be here. This place is _warm._

The halfling leads him into a clutter-stuffed dining room. At the table are seven strangers, one of whom is wearing the face of Verin’s brother.

Because Essek is _laughing._

Not just laughing – laughing helplessly, eyes screwed shut, body shaking as he leans over the table. Next to him, a human man is watching him laugh, and smiling. On his other side, a blue tiefling is howling with glee and clutching her ribs. Further down the table, a pale woman with a painted face is halfway through some kind of story, or an approximation of one, involving a cart and a kenku.

‘He’s _here,’_ the halfling says again.

The strangers look up. Essek’s laughter twists away into silence, and he stands. Not floats; stands, on his feet.

Essek looks at him, and Verin looks back, and wonders what in the Light’s name he’s meant to say to someone he barely knows how to speak to outside of formal functions. Is _this_ a formal function? Is he meant to thank his senior in the Den for the generosity of inviting him, or is he meant to smile at his brother?

Formality is the safer play; he’ll look a bit ridiculous if it’s unnecessary, but if he fails to show it where it’s expected, he’ll be a disgrace. He opens his mouth – and is interrupted by the tiefling whirling around to face Essek and saying, ‘Whoah. Essek, your brother is _so_ much beefier than you.’

The halfling hops up to take her own seat at the table. ‘You should draw them, Jessie. Caption them _Essek_ and _the hotter Essek.’_

‘It kind of depends on your perspective, though,’ the tiefling says. ‘I mean, if you’re into _rugged_ handsomeness, then yeah. But if you think of ‘hot’ as more charming and smart and, you know, elegant, then Essek is still hotter. Right, Caleb?’

The human man blinks. ‘Um – ‘

‘What my friends mean to say,’ Essek says, ‘is that it’s good you could make it. Mighty Nein, this is my younger brother, Verin. Verin, these are – well, sit down, and I’ll introduce you.’

Verin is about to bow, then decides that if two complete strangers have just had a conversation about his and his brother's relative hotness right in front of them, this is decidedly not a formal function. He smiles and nods instead, and takes a seat beside a firbolg who very definitely has a beetle crawling up his (rather fantastic) hair.

So Essek introduces them, one by one. There’s warmth in the way he speaks every name, pride in the way he describes their abilities – and when they interrupt him, he doesn’t purse his lips and frown. He smiles. He’s doing that a lot, Verin realises.

He looks a little awkward, perhaps. He also looks at home.

* * *

Another dinner party, over a decade ago:

The servants gather the dessert plates, flitting from place to place like Echoes on a battlefield. Verin follows his parents and the guests from Den Mirimm out into the gardens. Another tray of drinks is passed around, and people drift into clumps, sipping wine and making polite, unnecessary conversation about polite, unnecessary matters. His mother murmurs with the Skysibil; his father drones about matters of border defence with a Mirimm Taskhand. Essek hovers in a corner, shadowed by the topiary.

Verin always has half an eye on his mother at events like these, so he’s prepared when she catches his eye and beckons him over. He bows to her, then to the Skysibil, then to Essek, who has drifted over at another gesture from the Umavi. He knows what's coming, and yet he hopes it won't come, because it'll be awkward, and it'll be awful. But his mother shows them off like curated artworks at every formal gathering. There's not a hope in the hells that she stops now.

‘I don’t believe you’ve seen my youngest sons in some time, Abrianna,' she says, and Verin takes a moment to wish that she weren't so fucking predictable. 'Essek so rarely leaves the Conservatory these days, and Verin has only recently completed his training.’

The Skysibil’s eyes hover over both of them, then rest on Verin. ‘Adras speaks very highly of your accomplishments.’ 

The frustration simmering in Verin's chest gives way to warmth. ‘They’re a great teacher. I’m blessed to learn from their wisdom.’

‘You’ve been training as an Echo Knight, correct?’

‘I have,’ Verin says, and the Luxon is surely smiling on him, because the _Skysibil_ knows of his achievements, and his mother is seeing the Skysibil’s appreciation. _I will have to earn respect, Essek? Well, look at me go._

‘Den Thelyss might not be quite so known for that art as your own family,’ the Umavi says, looking at the Skysibil. ‘But am sure that with time, Verin will serve as a reminder that our Den has a long tradition of Echo Knights to match your own.’

The warmth inside him shrivels. Well, that will teach Verin not to get so pleased with himself so quickly: a reminder that he has done nothing special. Nothing that no one else hasn’t done before him. Oh, the joys of having a politician for a mother.

‘I’m to be sent to Urzin soon,’ he says, after double-checking that his smile is holding, and that his voice is hitting the appropriate levels of pleasantness. ‘To serve as a lieutenant to the Sunbreaker. Light willing, I will be of service to him, and he will recommend me for my own command in time.’

‘A great honour, indeed. My congratulations.’ The Skysibil inclines her head to him, and Verin breathes out. Gods, he hates this. Coming up with boasts, praying for the verbal pat on the shoulder. He’ll be free of that, in Urzin. Soldiers, he has found, care far less about the prettiness of someone's words, and far more about whether they’ll take a blade for the sorry bastard beside them.

‘And what of you?’ The Skysibil turns to Essek, whose face is half-hidden behind his wine glass, and who has not looked at Verin once throughout the conversation.

The Umavi answers for him. ‘There is word of Essek rising to a position in the Bright Queen’s court before long. His recent breakthroughs in dumantic practice have caught some very elevated eyes.’

‘Breakthroughs in dunamancy? Might I request a demonstration?’

Essek glances at the Umavi – who, like an Umavi, makes her decision quickly. She nods, and Essek conjures up his component pouch, withdraws a shard of obsidian, weaves a shape in the air, and –

And manifests a fucking echo.

Which is impossible. Essek is not an Echo Knight. But of course, Essek works with the art of possibility, so _impossible_ is clearly just a word to him, and Verin would like nothing so much as to kick something.

The Skysibil blinks. ‘That is impressive indeed. I had not thought this achievable by one who had not studied your brother’s arts.’

‘That is precisely why I was determined to prove that it was achievable,' Essek says, and smiles his charming, confident, satisfied Essek smile. 

‘Can it fight?' Verin asks. 'It isn't armed.'

Essek doesn't so much as glance at him. ‘No. But it can cast.’

Well, that’s it, then. Verin has been categorically upstaged. He has attained a middling military rank and a power that countless Dynasty warriors have achieved before him, while Essek has accomplished the unprecedented. And it’s fine, it _is,_ because Verin doesn’t _care_ about doing the unique, and Verin _does not want to be Essek –_

And all the same, it rankles. Essek has been lurking in corners all evening, and still, Verin is the one who ends up overshadowed.

The evening ends, the Mirimms leave, and once the gates have closed, the Umavi turns to her sons. ‘Essek. You did well. I am proud.’

Essek gives her a shallow bow.

‘Be mindful. Others will now seek to learn this magic you have created. Guard its secrets carefully; use it as leverage where you must.’ Her eyes flick over to Verin. ‘In the meantime, Verin – the Skysibil has seen many Echo Knights in her time. Do not allow yourself to become complacent. You've come far, but if you are to show yourself the equal of those many centuries your elder, there is a long way yet to go.’

Verin swallows back the bitter ache in his throat, smiles, and nods. ‘Umavi.’

They part in the corridor, their mother heading towards her own quarters, Essek and Verin continuing towards their own. There’s silence for a minute, after she leaves them. Then Essek shakes his head and lets out a small, frustrated breath. ‘Can we ever go a single formal event without being showed off like prize moorbounders?’

Verin swallows. ‘She is doing what’s best for us. You’ve said it yourself, many times: we’re going nowhere without the respect of those above us. When she shows us off, she gives us a chance to win that. I hate it too, but it's for the best.’

‘She is giving _herself_ a chance to show that her blood are worth something. To show that her youngest, new-souled sons do not diminish the Den.’

They have reached Essek’s room. Verin could walk on, but he doesn’t. His brother’s anger is so thick in the air, and Verin wants both to soothe it and to snap back at it. Wants to snarl, _thanks for showing me up in front of Umavi Mirimm._ Wants to hear Essek say, _I know. I shamed you, and I’m sorry._ Wants to be able to reply, _it’s all right, I understand why you did it, we’re both dealing with this bullshit –_

He breathes in, and looks at the floor. ‘This is unfair. We both know it’s unfair. But what use is there in straining against it? It’s just – it’s how things are, and regardless of anything else, she is our mother. She is an _Umavi.’_

‘So we never question? We never ask why, or ask for more?’ Essek’s lip curls, and he wrenches his door open with a smack of telekinesis. ‘If you believe that woman is a perfect soul, you have reached new heights of naivety.’

He goes into his room and shuts the door.

* * *

‘I’m sorry,’ Verin says, a forkful of mushroom risotto halfway to his mouth. ‘You _died?’_

Essek raises and lowers one shoulder. ‘Only mildly.’

‘You _mildly died?’_

‘I brought him back, like, super quick.’ The tiefling – Jester – pats Essek’s arm. ‘He was gone for like, thirty seconds –’

‘Twenty four seconds,’ Caleb says, very quietly.

‘ –while we killed the Scourger who attacked us. And then I was like, hey, Traveller, give us Essek back please, because we love him and he’s bleeding all over his fancy cloak.’

Verin grapples for something appropriate to say, and grapples even harder with the image in his head: his brother, his untouchable, immaculate brother, crumpled on the ground with dagger wounds torn across his body. Cradled by his friends as a perky tiefling begs a god for his life.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says, because that’s what you say when people die. 

‘The assassin was even more sorry.’ Essek chuckles into his wine glass. ‘I’m not keen to repeat the experience, to say the least, but… I think death is an occupational hazard of joining my friends here on their ventures. And should it happen again, I am in very good hands.’ He gestures to Jester, who beams, and Caduceus, who smiles and dips his head.

‘Is bringing people back a taboo or anything, over here?’ Fjord asks. ‘I mean, the consecution thing seems to be so important to you. If Essek had died here in Rosohna, would bringing him back be seen as, I don’t know, interfering with the Luxon’s work?’

Essek goes still. Verin’s mouthful of risotto feels suddenly tasteless. He swallows it down. ‘That’s… something of a matter for debate, honestly.’

‘And it _is_ debated.’ Essek’s voice is sour. ‘Constantly, by the priesthood.’

‘Clerics of the Luxon have the power to bring people back, including consecuted souls – assuming that the soul has not already been reborn, of course.’ Verin impales a green bean, and fights back the images of his father, brought back from Bazzoxan, lips still smeared with his own dried blood. ‘In those cases, consecuted souls have been revived by priests of the Luxon before the transition could occur. But life and rebirths are the Luxon’s domain. Some of the clergy are of the opinions that we should not attempt to interfere.’

‘And as always,’ Essek adds, pushing his cutlery together with a sharp metallic clink, ‘they prefer to simply forbid it than to _investigate_ the matter.’

 _Not again._ Decades since their father’s death, and Essek is still obsessed with questioning the Luxon’s every command. Decades, and Essek has learned _nothing._ Verin scrapes together the last of his risotto, swallows it down, and swallows the stinging words on his tongue down with it. He promised he'd be good to these people: that means no bitter religious debates at their dinner table. ‘It’s worth mentioning that the real bar to such rituals is the cost. I mean, not everyone has diamonds to throw away.’

Jester nods. ‘Makes sense. But mine was _definitely_ not thrown away.’

‘Fuck no,’ Beau says, and Yasha nods, and Caleb says, ‘Not at all.’

And the tension, the bitterness, drains from Essek's face like poison drawn from a wound under a cleric’s touch. He looks down, smiles, and says, ‘I only hope I can return the favour, somehow.’

The words are gentle and genuine and kind. Things that Essek has never been to Verin.

Verin was correct, earlier, when he thought that Essek could not possibly like these people. He does not like them: he _loves_ them. And they love him, too, because there’s love in the way that Beau's ribbing of him meets with fond retorts rather than razor-sharp jabs at her insecurities. There’s love in how Caduceus urges Essek to take a second helping of food, and announces that he’s made ‘that lemon tart you like so much’ for dessert. There’s love in how, whenever Caleb or Essek gushes about the arcane, the other watches with a wondering warmth.

Essek is happy here. Essek is home.

Verin likes these people too - and yet he has a sudden, fierce desire to get away from all of them. He pushes back his chair. ‘I was wondering. Could you tell me where the bathroom is?’

Seven hands point at once, some of them in opposite directions. Caduceus gets up, and gestures for Verin to follow him. ‘I’ll show you. I don’t need to heat up the dessert for a while.’

So Verin follows him down the corridor, making sure to stay at Caduceus's back so that his own face is invisible. Because he gets the impression that Caduceus sees a lot, and he doesn’t want this man to see what’s in his head right now.

He is happy for his brother. He _is._ Essek has spent over a century in a self-imposed isolation; now he is living a life. Finding friends, travelling, dying and being raised again by the people who do not want to know a world without him. He’s different: softer at the edges. Warmer.

But Verin trails behind Caduceus, his happiness for Essek is drowned by the two thoughts in his head. Both angry, both unfair.

The first is: _why does Essek get this?_

Verin has spent his entire life trailing in Essek's wake. Essek rose father, he glided through the ranks of the Den, and the one comfort Verin was ever able to give himself was that the price Essek paid was everything that mattered. Because Essek isn’t loved, Essek is _feared._ He’s never known thump of a comrade’s hand on his back and the warm ache of laughing, a little drunk, with your lieutenants late at night. Except he does, because now Essek is finishing the Mighty Nein's sentences and cracking their in-jokes. He is being smiled at gently. He has been dragged back from death.

 _He isn’t special,_ Verin thinks, bitterly, unjustly, unfairly, as he shuts the bathroom door behind himself. _He isn’t even_ kind. _He doesn’t deserve a home full of people who love him._ But he has it anyway, of course, because Essek gets everything he wants.

The second thought in Verin's head is quieter, and sadder, and just a little less petty.

_Why did he change for these people, love these people, and not his brother?_

_Why them and not me?_

* * *

On the day of the funeral, Verin dresses in white mourning robes, combs his hair, and gives up on trying not to hate his brother.

The house has been almost silent for days, as if the body resting in its old room under a Gentle Repose spell is a sleeper that even the rowdiest servants are too thoughtful to wake. So the sound of raised voices from the Umavi’s room cuts through the corridors, and pulls Verin towards it, tugged by a morbid curiosity that he knows he’ll regret.

‘ – out of the question,’ his mother is saying, as Verin draws close enough to make out words. ‘Do you think we would be holding a funeral if it were a possibility?’

And, of course, it’s Essek’s voice that snaps back. ‘He has been gone for less than a week. There is a chance, just a chance. Why is it not worth the attempt?'

A pause. Then – ‘Do you know how many times I have lost your father before? Or one of my previous spouses? Or my children?’ A lengthier silence, which Essek doesn't break. ‘We must wait only a little more than a decade, and he will return. I have done it more times than I care to count.’

‘Can you tell me what will happen to him? Tell me the arcane process by which he shall be returned to us. If he is returned.’

Even through the door, Verin hears his mother’s sharp intake of breath. ‘Is not a matter of the _arcane,_ Essek. This is the realm of the divine, and it is not your place to question.’

‘It is my _job_ to question.’

‘Not now. Not here, not this.’ There is a snarl in the Umavi’s voice, and even though he cannot see her, nor she him, Verin shrinks back. ‘I have welcomed him back many times. I have welcomed him back as a man, as a woman, as neither. I have found him again as a drow and a tiefling. Now I must mourn him again. I must wait for him again. And he will return again. There are some things that even you do not question, _Shadowhand_. There are some things you can only be thankful for.’

Seconds drag by. Verin senses rather than feels his mother approach the door, and steps back.

‘Learn patience,’ she says. ‘And be at the temple in an hour.’

The door opens, and the Umavi sweeps past Verin without seeing him, or at least without looking at him. Essek follows, sees Verin, and stops.

‘Did you ask her to send for a cleric?’ Verin asks. ‘For a resurrection ritual?’

There’s an odd, wild look in his brother’s eyes, one he’s never seen there before. ‘Give me a reason why we should not try. We could afford the diamond a thousand times over. If it fails, it fails, but if it does not –’

‘We are not going to violate the Luxon’s cycle of rebirth to assuage your fucking guilt.’

Essek stares at him.

‘Why does it matter to you? He never did.’ Verin’s voice is cracking, but he does not care. His gut is full of a century’s worth of resentment, and it’s clawing at the insides of his skin, and he needs it _out._ ‘You never loved him. You called him a coward, because he had no ambition. Because he was not interested in your damned questions about our god. He went to Bazzoxan angry and unprepared, to prove that he was more than what you said, and he _died there.’_

Essek opens his mouth, but – _no._ Not this time. This time, Verin gets to speak. ‘You care _nothing_ that he is dead. You don’t regret what you said. You only want him back so that you aren't the reason for him being gone, so that you can pretend you weren't wrong to question. Even now, you’re still angling to prove that your doubts are justified. _That_ is what you care about most on the day of our father’s funeral.’

At some point, he must have clenched his fists, because his nails are biting into his palms and his hands are shaking. Essek is still staring at him, still concealed by his cloak, _still fucking floating._

‘If you want me to weep for a man I barely knew,’ Essek says, ‘and who _you_ barely knew –’

‘I _want_ a _brother,_ Essek.’

Silence, again. Essek hovers. Verin’s eyes sting. He realises that he is crying, and decides to carry on. ‘I want a brother who’ll stand with me in my grief and help me shoulder it. But I don’t have one, and I will never have one, and I know this because _I_ have no ambition, not in the way that you think matters. You scorn me as you scorned our father, and I’ve made my peace with that.’

Essek says nothing.

‘I will serve our nation and I’ll take your disdain. Because when I give my blade and my blood to protect our people, I’ll know that I have something you do not. I know what it is to care for people outside myself. You’ve sealed your pride in ice and even our father’s death can’t thaw it. You are _alone.’_

Far too late, Verin remembers that half the servants, and probably the Umavi, can hear him. Well, let them. Let them see Essek as something more than the perfect prodigy for once. Let them see him for what he is.

He stares his brother down, and waits, wondering if - for the first time in his life - he will hear his brother apologise.

Instead, Essek looks him in the eye, and says, ‘So be it.’

And he drifts away after their mother.

The moment he turns the corner, Verin slumps back against the wall. He slides down it onto the floor, buries his face in the sleeve of his pristine white robe, and sobs until his lungs are spent.

* * *

‘Verin? Are you all right in there?’

 _Go away,_ Verin thinks. ‘I’m fine,’ he says, and gets to his feet.

Under the crack of the bathroom door, Essek’s feet shuffle a little. He still isn’t floating. Just one more absurdity to add to the evening’s list. ‘Caduceus says we have some time before dessert.’ A pause. ‘He, ah, also said I should speak to you. He was under the impression that you were… not at ease. I think the words he used were, 'I know the look of the responsible brother who feels left behind.'’ A longer pause; a creak of wood, as if Essek has leaned against the wall. ‘Do I have to have this conversation with you through a door?’

Verin yanks it open. ‘What conversation?’

‘The one about why I invited you. I mean, we all invited you, and it was actually Jester who suggested it, but I agreed, so…’ Essek glances towards the dining room. ‘These walls have ears. Have you seen the rooftop garden yet?’

Verin shakes his head, and follows Essek through the house and up the tower steps. The clamour of the voices below fades and mutes, and Essek glances at him. ‘So. What do you make of them?’

‘They’re… fun. Not the kinds of people I would have expected you to be friends with, honestly.’

‘Mm. No. I didn’t expect it either.’

‘They seem like a good influence on you.’

‘Ha. You have no idea.’

The steps open out onto the roof, and the stone under Verin’s feet turns to earth and moss. He takes a moment to appreciate the colourful results of Caduceus’s handiwork, then turns back to Essek. ‘All right. Why did you invite me here?’

‘Many reasons, really. But mostly so that I would have a chance to share some news with you.’ Essek looks down, fiddles with sleeve, and says, ‘I have resigned.’

Verin’s considered, measured response to this is, ‘You _what?’_

‘I am no longer the Shadowhand. I have informed the Bright Queen.’

‘I – what the fuck, Essek? Actually, no – _why_ the fuck?’

Essek sighs, and stares up at the lantern-lit tree. ‘My friends have offered me a place as one of them. It’s taken me a while to accept it, but… it seems this is a habit of mine, being late to accept their invitations. But accept it I did, in the end.'

‘But –’ Verin splutters for a few undignified seconds, because coming to terms with his brother being friends with a band of chaotic adventurers was one thing. Imagining Essek _as_ a chaotic adventurer is quite another. ‘But your position – it’s what you’ve worked towards your entire life.’

‘I have worked towards _magic_ my entire life. Towards unravelling mysteries and breaking the boundaries of what was thought possible. I don’t need a title to do that.’

‘But,’ Verin says, again. _But you have everything. Respect. Success. You even have love, now. You have everything you could ever want. That I have ever wanted._

Essek looks down, then back up at the tree branches, stirring gently above him. ‘Do you know how long Caleb has left to live? I think about it all the time. It’s sixty years; a little more if he’s fortunate. As for me, I have perhaps six hundred years left in me.’ He swallows, and folds his hands behind his back, each gripping the other tightly. ‘Which means: I will know Caleb for a tenth of my life at most.’

And there’s something that Verin has no idea how to respond to. He’s not sure there even _is_ a response to that. So it’s a relief when Essek continues speaking. ‘In fact, I will be there to lose them all, if we all live out our natural lifespans. Fjord first. Caleb and Beauregard next. Then Jester. Yasha. Veth. I will stand with Caduceus as he buries every one of them, and in the end, I will be there to watch _him_ buried. So tell me, Verin – what time do I have to waste?’

Verin stares, and knows an urge that he has only ever felt towards young recruits and terrified civilians before – to take hold of Essek’s arms, gently and firmly, and say that things will be all right. Except they won’t be all right, because no force he knows of can make a human outlive a drow.

Anything he says, now, would be inadequate, so he settles on simply answering the question. ‘None, I suppose. I... what did mother say?’

Essek’s lips purse.

‘ _Light._ She didn’t disown you?’

‘No. Not yet, at least. I am most certainly not welcome in the house, but… I urged her to consider this as me joining a group of ambassadors to the Empire, making sure Den Thelyss’s voice is heard in any discussions of peace they hold. I don’t know if she was convinced.’ He smiles ruefully. ‘If she does disown me, I can’t say there is much I will regret leaving behind.’

‘What will you regret leaving?’

‘Privacy. A comfortable bed. The absence of ancient white dragons.’

‘The absence of _what?’_

‘And one other thing. I…’ Essek’s jaw clenches, as if he is about to say something incredibly unpleasant. ‘I… _regret…_ leaving you to face the consequences of my decision. While our mother was attempting to dissuade me –’ Verin takes this to mean _while she was hurling every possible piece of blackmail and manipulation at me_ – ‘She mentioned the terrible shame I would be placing upon you. And for once, she was right. This will be a burden upon you. I wanted to warn you of it, and I wanted to…’ He grimaces. ‘Apologise. For it.’

‘Wow. This is really difficult for you, isn't it? Apologising?'

‘Yes. Please don’t make it worse.’

He's fiddling with his cloak again, looking restless and awkward and oddly young. ‘It’s all right,' Verin says, which he didn't expect to say, but he finds he means it. 'Honestly. I’ve proven myself plenty of times, and I can do it once more.’

Essek looks at him at last. ‘Good. Just don't get yourself killed behind the Umbra Gates while you're doing it. You are -’ Again, he hesitates - ‘worth more than the respect you can win by shedding your own blood.’

‘First of all, I cannot believe you just complimented me. Second of all, I know. It's taken me a while, but I know.'

The corner of Essek’s mouth tugs upward. ‘Good,' he says again, and then, 'You know, I have envied you. At times.’

‘ _You_ envied _me?’_

‘For being the youngest. Our mother had not given birth to a new soul in decades, until I came along. I bore the brunt of her disappointment, her disdain. With you – she had been through it once. She was resigned to it. She expected little from either of us, but I suppose I felt there was less pressure on you to prove her wrong. To prove yourself.'

Verin feels a sudden, bizarre urge to laugh. ‘I envied you for the same reason. I had a family’s worth of shadows on me, and on top of them all, I had to deal with the Shadowhand’s shadow. I thought you had it so much easier.’

‘Which was what Mother intended, I’m sure. Us, seeing each other as rivals. Pushing each other harder. And her affection was the prize to be won, but she never intended to award it to either of us.’ Essek sighs again. ‘And I always did exactly what she wanted of me. Oh, I resented her, and rebelled against her in private, but I allowed her to shape me, all the same. I would understand if you despised me.’

A day ago, Verin would have said that there was no _if_ about it. He doesn’t say this now. Instead he says, ‘Where the hells did all this self-awareness come from?’

‘Time and work. A broadening of perspective. A lot of Caduceus's tea. Listen – what you said to me, the day of our father’s funeral? It was true. I have more regrets now than I did then – the Nein have taught me a great deal about regret – but I _have_ disdained you, for a long time. You were not interested in the things I thought were important, and I... I did not understand it, or you. I understood, in theory, that you were going through some of the same difficulties as myself, but I don't think I really _felt_ what that meant.’

‘What did it mean?’

‘That you could have done with a brother who understood, and cared. And I failed you, I think. Still, it seems that while I was busy turning into our mother, you remained yourself, even without my help. That's no small feat.’

‘Um. Thanks. I think. Is myself a good thing?’

Essek shrugs. ‘Probably, seeing as the Mighty Nein like you. And besides, you believe in things like honour, and you believe in the Dynasty. I can't say I agree, but knowing you are staying, that you're loyal to this place, gives me... some degree of hope that things may yet change here. That someone cares enough to make this place better than before.’

‘Right. So, while you scarper off with your friends, I get to redeem all of Xhorhas. No pressure or anything.’

And Essek laughs.

It was surreal, watching Essek laugh with the Nein. Now, Essek is laughing with Verin, and it’s impossible, and it’s incredible - and is it selfish of Verin to enjoy it, when Essek still caused their father’s death? Or would it be selfish to keep hating Essek, now that Essek has apologised, and changed? Would it be selfish to hate, when Verin never really tried all that hard to understand him, either?

 _Questions for later,_ Verin decides, and laughs too.

‘Will I see you again?’ he says, once he’s done laughing, and Essek shrugs again.

‘I will be on the road a great deal. But when I’m not, you know where I’ll be.’ He gestures towards the steps that lead to his friends.

‘True. And I guess we have six hundred years to have another try at the whole _brothers_ thing.’

Essek looks down. ‘Only if you’re willing.’

‘I’m willing, Essek. I would have been ninety years ago, if I'd ever felt that you'd been willing too.’

This is a new experience, seeing his brother smile at him. For a moment, Verin wonders if it would be right, or expected, for him to step forward and pull Essek into a hug. For another moment, he almost does. But he doesn’t – can’t, really. There’s still a decades-old pile of mess between them: a dead father, and cruel words, and the fact that they’ve never really _known_ each other.

But they have six hundred years to clear that mess away. For now, it’s enough for Verin to know that he might end up hugging Essek, someday, and that Essek might not complain. So he holds out his hand instead, and after a moment, Essek takes it. The soldier’s hand clasps the scholar’s and Verin realises, with a jolt, that both hands bear scars.

Then Caduceus’s voice shouts from down the stairs. ‘Desserts are ready.’

Essek lets go, flexes his fingers awkwardly, and nods towards the steps. ‘Come. This will be good.’

 _It might,_ Verin thinks, as he heads downstairs, by the side of the man who for the first time in a hundred years, feels like a brother. _I really think it might._

**Author's Note:**

> Now Essek just needs to hide the whole treason thing from Verin. What could possibly go wrong?
> 
> Title from 'Heirloom' by Sleeping At Last.


End file.
